Nathan Rourke threw for 366 yards and three touchdowns as the B.C. Lions rallied from 14 points down to beat the Saskatchewan Roughriders 33-26 in the West Division semifinal on Saturday at BC Place. The defending Grey Cup champions are out of the playoffs, and B.C. travels to Edmonton for the West Final on November 7.
FINAL: B.C. Lions 33, Saskatchewan Roughriders 26
How to watch: Saskatchewan Roughriders vs B.C. Lions, Saturday, October 31, 2026, at BC Place in Vancouver
TV (Canada): TSN
Stream: TSN+
Next up: B.C. Lions at Edmonton Elks, West Final, Saturday, November 7, 2026, in Edmonton
Lions Roughriders West Semifinal Turns In The Third Quarter
For 25 minutes this looked like a repeat of the last two postseasons, both of which ended for B.C. at Saskatchewan’s hands. The Lions fumbled on the first play from scrimmage, Brett Lauther opened the scoring with a 55-yard field goal, and when Tommy Stevens muscled in for Saskatchewan’s only touchdown and Trevor Harris hit Samuel Emilus for the two-point convert, the Roughriders led 17-3 midway through the second quarter and the home crowd had gone quiet. Rourke answered with the play that changed the night, scrambling out of the pocket and lobbing a pass to an unmarked Stanley Berryhill III, who took it 69 yards for a touchdown. Sean Whyte’s 48-yard field goal with 12 seconds left in the half cut the lead to 17-13, and B.C. went into the room down four despite playing nowhere near its best football.
The third quarter belonged to Rourke and Jevon Cottoy. After Lauther’s fourth field goal pushed the lead back to 20-13, Rourke found Cottoy on a quick throw and the Canadian receiver split the defence and sprinted 70 yards to tie the game 20-20. Lauther answered again, his fifth field goal of the night, before Rourke hit Cottoy a second time, from 13 yards, for a 27-23 lead that was B.C.’s first of the game. The Lions never gave it back. Head coach Buck Pierce, himself a former CFL quarterback, was still shaking his head at the Berryhill play afterward:
He never ceases to amaze me. That play right there, you just look at the effort, the will he had to get something going for the offence, get something going for the team. And it ignited the crowd, it ignited the sideline.
Rourke Outduels Harris As Lauther Carries Saskatchewan
Rourke finished 21 of 32 for 366 yards and three touchdowns, with another 30 yards on the ground, and Cottoy was his main weapon all night: eight catches for 131 yards and two touchdowns. Whyte added four field goals, including 34 and 24-yard kicks in the fourth quarter that stretched the lead to 33-23 at the three-minute warning. Rourke was quick to hand the credit to the other side of the ball, telling reporters the defence won the game:
They’ve been incredible all year. Our defence was able to win it for us. And that’s a testament to how great they’ve been and how crucial they’ve been to this football team.
Saskatchewan’s night is in its kicking line. Lauther made six field goals, two of them from 55 yards, and accounted for 18 of the Riders’ 26 points, but the offence that produced one touchdown in 60 minutes kept settling. TSN’s game summary put the Riders at 1-for-3 in the red zone, and that failure told the story: Harris threw one interception, Stevens scored the lone major, and a 44-yard Lauther field goal with 1:36 left cut the lead to 33-26 and set up one last chance. Whyte’s 49-yard attempt fell short with 49 seconds to go, Saskatchewan took over needing a touchdown, and the drive stalled at B.C.’s 34-yard line. Harris did not hide from it afterward: “You want to win a championship every single year. Of course you do. And so when you come up short it sucks, it hurts.”
A Season Of Comebacks Gets One More
The comeback fits the season. B.C. started 1-5, then won nine of its next 10 games to reach the playoffs, and both teams arrived at 10-8, with the Lions hosting because they won the season series 2-1. A crowd of 23,283 watched the latest rally, and this one carried history with it: Saskatchewan had bounced B.C. from the postseason in both 2024 and 2025, and the Riders came in as the defending Grey Cup champions. Their elimination means a new Grey Cup champion will be crowned for the fifth consecutive season. Cottoy described a locker room at halftime that had heads down but no panic, a group that knew it was only four points back despite its worst half of the month.
West Final In Edmonton Closes The Road To Calgary
The Lions now travel to face the Edmonton Elks, who finished 13-5 and waited out the semifinal round, in the West Final on Saturday, November 7. The East Final runs the same day, with the Winnipeg Blue Bombers, who stunned Toronto 25-22 in the East semifinal earlier on Saturday, visiting the Montreal Alouettes. The winners meet at the Grey Cup on Sunday, November 15 in Calgary. B.C. is one win from that game for the first time in this run, and it gets there behind a quarterback playing the best football of his CFL career, a defence that held the defending champions to one touchdown, and a team that has made a season out of climbing out of holes. Saturday night in Vancouver, down 14 with its season on the line, that is exactly what B.C. did one more time.
